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> who sell you, by word of mouth, to their circle of friends and family The warcry of uberfans of this or that IP the world over. I don't buy it anymore. That

> who sell you, by word of mouth, to their circle of friends and family The warcry of uberfans of this or that IP the world over. I don't buy it anymore. That group can help, but they're not necessary for an IP/service to move forward. Worse, they have higher demands and expectations and feel personally offended when you do wrong by them. Whether it's Humble dropping Linux or Marvel not lampshading a character detail, I'm moving closer to the perspective that a sold ticket is a sold ticket. But a sold ticket that doesn't result in a swarm of complaint emails is worth its weight in gold.

toyg 5y ago
Without the silly DRM launcher, they would have had no complaining emails or support tickets either.
Mezzie 5y ago
I think it matters when a service or good is new, but not so much later. In the 90s when you had to convince people that video games were worth the time + most people didn't have a home PC? Yeah, in that case a person who plays games on their Linux machine is important to growing the community. Same for things like trying to convince people to watch anime back when you often had to buy fansubbed VHSes in the mail. Now everybody and their mom knows what video games are + they're an accepted component of life and there's a huge gaming market, so uberfans aren't necessary for growth.
- mcguire 5y ago
  "In the 90s when you had to convince people that video games were worth the time + most people didn't have a home PC? Yeah, in that case a person who plays games on their Linux machine is important to growing the community." There were no games available on Linux in the '90s.* * Except for those specifically written there.
  - toyg 5y ago
    > There were no games available on Linux in the '90s. Indeed. Before 1998 there wasn't even a proper full-blown desktop.
    - mcguire 5y ago
      Now, I wouldn't go quite that far. (I've been a Linux user since 1992-ish 0.99pl12 or 14.) It was pretty competitive with other Unixes, particularly since it didn't cost a million, billion dollars.
      - toyg 5y ago
        I guess it depends on one's definition of "full-blown desktop" - KDE is from '98 and GNOME followed later, even Window Maker is from '97, but if one was happy with fvwm then he'd have been sorted since '93.
Ekaros 5y ago
I wonder if these people also push to release the apps their companies make for Linux phones. After all those are the power users pushing the word of mouth of great apps they get on their Linux phones...
matheusmoreira 5y ago
> a sold ticket is a sold ticket > But a sold ticket that doesn't result in a swarm of complaint emails is worth its weight in gold What? Service sucks but we're not supposed to complain? We're supposed to just pay quietly and shut up? It's comments like these that makes me glad piracy exists.
- musingsole 5y ago
  In this case, Humble is taking more of a "don't pay; go talk to someone else" approach. They don't care if you go pirate the IP.

toyg 5y ago

Without the silly DRM launcher, they would have had no complaining emails or support tickets either.

Mezzie 5y ago

I think it matters when a service or good is new, but not so much later. In the 90s when you had to convince people that video games were worth the time + most people didn't have a home PC? Yeah, in that case a person who plays games on their Linux machine is important to growing the community. Same for things like trying to convince people to watch anime back when you often had to buy fansubbed VHSes in the mail. Now everybody and their mom knows what video games are + they're an accepted component of life and there's a huge gaming market, so uberfans aren't necessary for growth.

mcguire 5y ago
"In the 90s when you had to convince people that video games were worth the time + most people didn't have a home PC? Yeah, in that case a person who plays games on their Linux machine is important to growing the community." There were no games available on Linux in the '90s.* * Except for those specifically written there.
- toyg 5y ago
  > There were no games available on Linux in the '90s. Indeed. Before 1998 there wasn't even a proper full-blown desktop.
  - mcguire 5y ago
    Now, I wouldn't go quite that far. (I've been a Linux user since 1992-ish 0.99pl12 or 14.) It was pretty competitive with other Unixes, particularly since it didn't cost a million, billion dollars.
    - toyg 5y ago
      I guess it depends on one's definition of "full-blown desktop" - KDE is from '98 and GNOME followed later, even Window Maker is from '97, but if one was happy with fvwm then he'd have been sorted since '93.

Ekaros 5y ago

I wonder if these people also push to release the apps their companies make for Linux phones. After all those are the power users pushing the word of mouth of great apps they get on their Linux phones...

matheusmoreira 5y ago

> a sold ticket is a sold ticket > But a sold ticket that doesn't result in a swarm of complaint emails is worth its weight in gold What? Service sucks but we're not supposed to complain? We're supposed to just pay quietly and shut up? It's comments like these that makes me glad piracy exists.

musingsole 5y ago
In this case, Humble is taking more of a "don't pay; go talk to someone else" approach. They don't care if you go pirate the IP.